Black Diamonds Part 2

In his mind a total revolution had taken place. The intellectual spirits had for the nonce deserted him, and in their place others had come of a very different order--those demons which the blessed Antony had fought with such good effect in the desert.

When poor Ivan tried to banish these tempters by burying himself in his books and his scientific instruments the form of Evila came between him and the experiment he was busy on, just as Marguerite appeared to Doctor Faust in his laboratory; her voice sounded in his ear, her eyes glowed in the coals, and when he tried to write he found himself drawing a maiden in a blue bodice and short red skirt. It was the same with everything he undertook. Some mocking demon seemed bent on tormenting him.

Abandoning his experiments, this unfortunate man took to reading a volume of light literature. What did he open on? The loves of great and n.o.bly-born men for lowly-born and inferior women. Thus Lord Douglas fell in love with a shepherdess, and became a shepherd for her sake; Count Pelletier took for his wife a gypsy girl, and went about the streets turning an organ; Bernadotte, the King of Sweden, sought the hand of a young girl who watched a flock of geese for a farmer; Archduke John married the daughter of a postmaster; and another Austrian duke raised an actress to the position of grand d.u.c.h.ess; the consort of Peter the Great was the daughter of a villager; a Bonaparte married a washerwoman who had been his mistress.

And why not? Are not beauty, sweetness, fidelity, and true worth to be found under a woollen as well as under a silken frock? And, on the other hand, do we not find sinners enough in the upper circles?

Did not Zoraida kill her own children, and was she not a born princess? Faustina took money from her lovers, although she was the daughter of an emperor; the Marquise Astorgas ran a hairpin through her husband's heart; Semiramis strewed a whole churchyard with the corpses of her spouses; King Otto was poisoned in a grove by his queen; Joanna of Naples treasured the ribbon with which the king, her husband, was strangled; Jeanne Lafolle tormented her husband to death; the Empress Catharine betrayed her sovereign and consort, and connived at his murder; and the Borgias, Tudors, Cillis, all had wives who became notorious in that they wore entwined in their crowns the girdle of Aphrodite.

And do we not find the most exalted virtue in what is called low life?

The actress Gaussin, to whom her wealthy lover gave a check with _carte blanche_ to write a million thereupon, only wrote that she would always love him, Quintilla, another actress, bit off her tongue, lest she should betray her lover, who was implicated in a conspiracy; Alice, who undertook to fight a duel for her husband, and was killed; and many others who have suffered silently and died for very love.

Philosophy and history both conspired against Ivan. And then came sleep.

A dream is a magic mirror in which we see ourselves as we would be if our own wishes and inclinations were all-powerful. In his dream the bald man has hair and the blind sees.

Towards the end of the following week Ivan made the discovery that he had lost the use of his understanding. The more he endeavored to force his mind back to its original groove of abstract theories, the more the demons ranged themselves against him. One evening, in a fit of absence of mind, he overheated one of the retorts, so that it burst in his face, and the small gla.s.s particles cut his nose and cheek, and he was forced to bind up his wounds with bits of sticking-plaster. It did not occur to him that these strips of black diachylon placed obliquely across his nose did not improve his appearance. He was, however, very angry at his own folly--a folly which went still further, for he began to argue with himself in this way:

"It would be better to marry this girl than to become mad for her sake. Marry her? Who ever heard the like? A pit-girl! What a _mesalliance_! And who cares? Am I not alone in the world? Do I not form the whole family? And does not this constant thought of her come between me and my business? If this goes on I shall be ruined; and as for the _mesalliance_, is there a soul for six miles round who understands the meaning of the word? Not one; and if there should be one, he would have to seek me in the coal-pit, and he would find my face blackened with coal-dust, so that no one could see me blush for shame."

All the same, he never sought the girl. He waited for the Sat.u.r.day, when he knew she would come for her weekly wages, and on that day she appeared, as usual, the last, because she was the youngest, and stood before him as he sat at his desk. But this time, when Ivan had put the money into Evila's hand, he kept the little fingers in his firm clasp.

The girl laughed--perhaps at the plasters, which still ornamented her lover's face.

"Listen to me, Evila. I have something to say to you."

Evila looked uneasy; she ceased to laugh.

"Will you have me for your lover? Nay, my child, I mean you no harm; only one must play the lover before one talks of marriage."

The girl nodded, and then shook her head. "It is not possible," she said.

"Not possible! Why not?"

"Because I am already engaged."

Ivan let go his clasp of her hand. "To whom?"

"That I am not going to tell you," said Evila, "for if I did, I know very well what you would do. You would discharge him, or you would keep him back, and we cannot be married until he is taken on as a regular pitman."

"You mean as a day laborer?"

"Yes."

"And you think more of this low fellow than you do of me, your employer?"

The girl shrugged her shoulders, held her head a little to one side, and threw a look at Ivan which sent the blood coursing to his head.

Then she went on, quietly--

"I gave him my promise before mother died, and I must keep my word."

"To the devil with your father and your mother!" cried Ivan, out of himself with baffled hope and rage. "Do you imagine I care what you have promised to a fellow like that? I ask you again, will you give him up and come to me?"

Again Evila shook her head. "I dare not. My bridegroom is a wild, desperate fellow; he would think nothing of doing for you, and setting the pit on fire into the bargain when bad weather was on.

Good-evening!" And so saying, she ran away quickly, and mingled with her companions.

Ivan threw the day-book from him so violently that the leaves flew from one corner to another. A common creature, a wheelbarrow-girl, a half-savage, had dared to cross his wishes and refuse his offer! And for a dirty, miserable, underground miner--a common mole!

Ivan had a hard battle to fight with himself when he was once more alone in the solitude of the night. The suppressed pa.s.sion of the ascetic had suddenly broken through the dams, which moderation had set up to restrain its course.

Beware of the man who professes to be above human pa.s.sion, who glories in his iron will and his heart of ice; avoid him and the quiet, holy, studious man of soft tongue, who turns away his eyes from women, and shuns what others enjoy. It is upon such as these that outraged human nature revenges itself; and once the demon within gets loose, he plays a fine game to indemnify himself for all the restraint he has undergone. The love of the worldling is a small dog; that of the hermit is a lion.

With this wild beast, which he had suddenly unchained, did Ivan, the man of science, spend the long night, now walking up and down the narrow room, now throwing himself on his bed, a prey to the most horrible temptations, his heart beating with a thousand pa.s.sionate desires, his thoughts running in as many evil directions. The opposition that had been made to its wishes by Evila had stimulated his pa.s.sion, and also roused the pride of his nature. The master of the Bondavara mine was a man of fiery temper, kept in check by his strong command over himself; but this command seemed now at fault. He had no longer any power to lay this demon, which had got possession of him, tempting him from every side. With his powerful fist he struck himself a blow upon his chest, near to his throbbing heart.

"Wilt thou be silent? Who is master, thou or I? Do thy duty, slave. I am thy lord, thy king. Thy duty consists in nothing but keeping my arteries in motion, in pumping the air into my lungs, in forcing the blood in the right direction. When you cease your work, your illness is atrophy; but you cannot be my master, for the sovereign ruler is my will."

And as Ivan beat his breast, it seemed to him as if in a magic mirror there were reflected two forms--himself and another Ivan, with whom he waged a deadly combat. It appeared to him as if this other self had robbed him of his form and features, to perpetrate in his name the most odious sins, and as he hit out against this horrid image of himself, it slowly vanished; and then Ivan, falling back upon his pillow, cried out in a loud voice, "Never return, O fiend; never defile my sight again!"

In another hour, pale and exhausted, Ivan was seated quietly before his desk. It required an heroic effort on his part to go into prosaic calculations, to add up long columns of figures; but he forced his weary brain, his tired fingers to the task, and the slave obeyed its master, the body submitted to the mind.

CHAPTER III

THE MAN-EATER

The morning light found Ivan still seated at his table. As daybreak and lamplight did not agree, he extinguished his lamp, threw aside his papers, and gave himself a momentary rest.

He had conquered; he was himself again. All the fire of pa.s.sion had died out, the sinful images had vanished, and in his breast reigned profound peace. He had resolved upon his course; an angel had been at his side and inspired him.

It was Sunday morning. The engines which work the distillery were at rest. On Sundays the enormous water-basin, or trough, which fed the steam-pump was utilized to remove the dirt of the week from the miners. From six to seven the basin was free to the women, from half-past seven to nine to the men. The keys of the great pump-house were given over by the machine superintendent on every Sat.u.r.day night to Ivan, so that no curious or peeping Tom of Coventry could hide himself there, and see these Venuses bathing through a little window, which gave upon the basin, and which was placed there to allow the stoker to see that the water-course was not disturbed when the pumps were at work.

It had never once entered Ivan's brain that he could play Tom if he were so minded. But on this Sunday morning he took the key from its nail and put it in his pocket. Don't start; he did this, not between six and seven, but shortly after eight o'clock. He wanted to see the men bathing, unseen himself. And wherefore? Because he knew the customs which prevail in coal-mines, and that when a pair are engaged, it is customary to inscribe the name of the girl upon the man's naked body. Where the miners have got this Indian and savage method is hard to say. There is a certain tenderness in it, and tenderness is more often found with the savage than the civilized man. The lovers tattoo themselves with a needle, upon the arm or shoulder, and then rub in a corrosive acid, either red or blue. Such a testimony is ineffaceable.

Sometimes some poetic temperament adds two hearts transfixed by an arrow, or a couple of doves, or it may be the signs of the miner--the mallet and the pick. It occasionally happens that the relations alter, and the lover would gladly remove the name of the fickle one from his alb.u.m. This can be done by placing a blister over the name, and then the writing vanishes, together with the skin; a new skin grows, and upon this a new name can be written. It is a real palimpsest. Many are not so discreet. They punctuate a fresh name under the old one, and let the register increase, until sometimes there is not a vacant place.

It did not give Ivan much trouble to find the man he sought. As soon as the water removed the black soot from the bodies of the bathers, he saw on the shoulder of one of them the name of Evila, the letters in blue, two hearts in red. His rival was an intelligent, most industrious laborer; he was called Peter Saffran, and his comrades had added the nickname--the man-eater. To this misnomer Peter had never taken any umbrage. He was a particularly quiet man, and when they teased him he took no notice. He never complained of anything, and never entered either the church or the tavern. Towards children he had a particular antipathy. If one came near him he drove it away, ground his teeth together, and threw anything he had in his hand at it. This peculiarity was so well known that the mothers always cautioned the little ones against the man-eater. For the rest, he was on good terms with every one.

Ivan, having found what he wanted, left the pump-house and returned home, placing himself before the door, so that he could see the people as they went by presently in groups towards the neighboring village to the church. He noticed that Evila was among them. He examined her critically and in cold blood, and he came to quite a scientific conclusion as to the peculiar character of her beauty, which showed a mixture of races. The small hands and feet, the slender form, the narrow forehead, the finely cut nose, the silky black hair--all spoke the Indian or Hindoo type; but the short upper lip and the long, serpent-like eyebrows were derivable from some Slav ancestor. The starry, seductive eyes were decidedly Eastern, the chin and the coloring recalled the Malay race, and the quick, sudden rising of the red blood to the velvet cheek the Caucasian--for this people blush constantly, owing to the cellular texture being fine almost to transparency.

Ivan pondered on all this as Evila pa.s.sed him; he wondered also why her lover was not with her, for this was an established custom in Bondavara. Peter, however, evidently did not mind these rules of courts.h.i.+p; he was lounging on one of the benches outside the gates of the ventilation-oven, close to the pitmouth, his head in the air, his chin in his hand.

Ivan went to him. "Good-morning, Peter. What are you doing there, my man?"

"I am listening to the wind that is coming from below."

"Why don't you go to church?"